Shaver leads Democratic field in Ohio 5th primary

FINDLAY — Early returns Tuesday showed Brian Shaver leading in the Democratic primary for Ohio's 5th Congressional District, according to unofficial results from the Ohio Secretary of State's Office. Shaver had 11,848 votes statewide, ahead of Martin M. Heberling III with 10,662, Daniel John Burket with 10,089, and Scott E. Tabor with 8,719, based on the initial totals. All vote totals are unofficial and include absentee ballots. In Hancock County, Burket led with 774 votes, followed by Shaver with 689, Tabor with 555, and Heberling with 274, according to the Hancock County Board of Elections. A total of 2,292 ballots were cast in the county's Democratic primary for the 5th District. The Associated Press called the race for Shaver at 10:21 p.m. Tuesday based on its analysis of the vote. Shaver is the Fostoria City Council president and a longtime social studies teacher at Fostoria Junior/Senior High School. In your pre-election coverage, he described himself as a pragmatic, community-focused candidate shaped by years of working directly with families, students, and local government. His platform emphasized government transparency, campaign finance reform, term limits, and strengthening democratic institutions, with a repeated focus on restoring trust in public service. He told voters he wanted to "bring people together" and approach problems with practical, collaborative solutions rather than partisan fights. Shaver will face Republican U.S. Rep. Bob Latta in November. Latta was unopposed in the GOP primary, and no independent candidates filed for the race. Under Ohio's election calendar, write-in candidates have until Aug. 24 to file a declaration of intent with the Ohio Secretary of State's Office. Statewide, Shaver held 28.68%, followed by Heberling at 25.80%, Burket at 24.42%, and Tabor at 21.10%. A total of 41,318 votes had been counted in the race at that point. As of 10:30 p.m., the Ohio Secretary of State's Office reported that 80.65% of Election Day precincts statewide had reported. The 5th Congressional District covers a wide stretch of northwestern and north-central Ohio, taking in all of Hancock, Seneca, Crawford, Henry, Huron, Lorain, Mercer, Paulding, Putnam, Van Wert and Wood counties.